Polar Bear Angels: Humorous, Insightful and Irreverent Stories from a Reverend

By Keith Rasey

It is considered a cliché to reiterate that truth is stranger than fiction. This book is not a cliché.
In the pages that follow you will discover the poignant happenings, the unusual people and the just plain weird things that happened to a real flesh and blood person. I wasn’t looking to live on the edge - the “edgy” and novel and outrageous found me.
Perhaps your reaction will be like the young woman who, at a church singles group I spoke with, noted that I had too much experience for her to imagine me as a minister. If you like your understanding of the spiritual life to be black and white, cut and dried, this book may either leave you shaking your head or wondering where I am “coming from.”
If you have, however, an understanding that the spiritual life is a narrow way that is high and lifted up, like a tightrope, you might hold your breath as I try to keep my balance and find my way guided only by the Spirit, my conscience and intuition.
My goal is to leave you laughing, crying, smiling, chuckling and nodding your head in the realization that you have met some of the same kind of people as I have in my years in the ministry. The church power broker, the suffering addict, the innocent struggling to understand the hard realities of life, the broken and misplaced, the “party girls,” the manipulators of a kid’s game into life and death and those who have had the spark of life beaten out of them.
This book represents the journey of a lifetime of serving others. The true events described are widely separated in time. Names and details have been changed to protect the innocent and the guilty. I hope you enjoy the trip.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Keith Rasey
• Release date: Nov 18, 2011
• ISBN: 9781452454634

Keith Rasey

Keith A. Rasey is a graduate of Eastern Michigan University, Yale Divinity School and Kent State University. He has Bachelor of Science degrees in History and Economics and Gerontology and Long Term Health Care Management. He has a Master of Divinity. Keith has done postgraduate work in organizational leadership and advancement at Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University. He is also a Licensed Nursing Home Administrator. Keith has over twenty-five years of experience in working with patients and families at the end of life. The very first patient to die at home in the United States, while receiving care from hospice, was a member of the parish he served as minister on May 25, 1977. Keith was working with hospice as a volunteer before hospice care was approved for payment by the Federal government. He is particularly skilled and experienced at Judeochristian and Buddhist approaches and practices for end of life care. He is currently exploring the ways in which traditional healers, aka shamans, practices can inform, enrich and deepen spiritual care at the end of life. He also understands that, from a family systems' viewpoint, humor, wit and whimsy are ways of being in the world that can create a way for change in organizations and groups that are stuck in a rut. Some of the "crazy" things that traditional healers do may offer us postmodern people a way to live more authentic, centered and whole lives in the sociocultural contexts of our present lives. "The Landscapes of Our Patients' Journeys" grew out of his interest in both science based or evidence based approaches and spirituality. The Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services is increasingly requiring hospices to measure the quality of care and the patient/family experience. "The Landscapes of Our Patients' Journeys" offers a method to marry narrative and data that provides a means to assess the patient/family experience of end of life and measure the quality of caregivers' responses. He is currently formating his newest book, "Polar Bear Angels: Humorous, Insightful and Irreverent Stories from a Reverend," to make it conform to epublishing platforms. It is based on real interactions. As has often been noted, real life is far more unbelievable, outrageous, poignant and humorous than anything that can be made up. Keith lives with Diane, his wife of twenty years, and two dogs, Benny and Sunshine. He enjoys theater, cinema, travel, reading and jogging his two canine housemates through a five mile route in a local cemetery.

Book preview

Polar Bear Angels

Keith A. Rasey

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Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2011 Keith A. Rasey

License Notes: This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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AUTHOR’S NOTE

It is considered a cliché to reiterate that truth is stranger than fiction. This book is not a cliché.

In the pages that follow you will discover the poignant happenings, the unusual people and the just plain weird things that happened to a real flesh and blood person. I wasn’t looking to live on the edge - the edgy and novel and outrageous found me.

Perhaps your reaction will be like the young woman who, at a church singles group I spoke with, noted that I had too much experience for her to imagine me as a minister. If you like your understanding of the spiritual life to be black and white, cut and dried, this book may either leave you shaking your head or wondering where I am coming from.

If you have, however, an understanding that the spiritual life is a narrow way that is high and lifted up, like a tightrope, you might hold your breath as I try to keep my balance and find my way guided only by the Spirit, my conscience and intuition.

My goal is to leave you laughing, crying, smiling, chuckling and nodding your head in the realization that you have met some of the same kind of people as I have in my years in the ministry. The church power broker, the suffering addict, the innocent struggling to understand the hard realities of life, the broken and misplaced, the party girls, the manipulators of a kid’s game into life and death and those who have had the spark of life beaten out of them.

This book represents the journey of a lifetime of serving others. The true events described are widely separated in time. Names and details have been changed to protect the innocent and the guilty. I hope you enjoy the trip.

Keith A. Rasey

Medina, Ohio

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Chapter One

POLAR BEAR ANGELS

Elinda’s mother was not a member of the church I served as pastor. She did live in the neighborhood of the church in a section of New Haven known as Fairborn. A couple I was working with on premarital counseling had told her about my ability to listen well and draw together disparate thoughts into sensible insights.

I had no idea why she was coming to see me because all she had shared on the phone was a desire to talk with me about a problem their family was having. The day of the appointment we introduced ourselves and she asked me to call her by her first name, Paula. She was dark haired, about thirty-five years of age, I guessed, but with the worry lines of an older woman. There were no laugh lines or even smile creases on her face From the smell of stale smoke, it was painfully obvious Paula was a chain smoker so I scanned the office to be sure the ashtray was handy for her.

The introductory class on pastoral counseling I was taking had taught me enough to realize it was important to practice graciousness and hospitality to put her at ease, especially, as in this instance, when she was coming to talk with a stranger about something troubling. This was years before there was any concern about second hand smoke.

So, I said in my best nondirective, Rogerian counseling voice, you are hoping to talk with me to bring greater insight into a family member’s underlying motivations? It sure sounded good at the moment.

Not exactly, she responded. There was a long silence. I was being taught to let the silence hang around like an old friend.

My daughter, Elinda is worrying me. She has started to really resist going to school in the morning. She is more moody than she has ever been and breaks out in tears if we mildly punish her.

It’s your daughter who is your concern, I responded in my gentlest, nondirective voice. I waited for her response but there was none. Silence was failing me. You’re worried about her recent change in behavior - the school resistance and the moodiness.

That did bring a verbal response from her. We went through the family history covering such things as how long they had been married, how many children they had and their ages, job and location stability, birth order, etc. Nothing brought up any obvious precipitating event that might have triggered five-year old Elinda’s behavior.

Elinda was the youngest of three children, her two older siblings being a boy of nine and a sister of fourteen. They were the third generation of their family to be born in America. Their family had lived in the same house for the past twelve years. The father had had the same blue collar job with the city for all of his adult life. Paula did not work outside the home.

Five-year old Elinda attended the same kindergarten in the same neighborhood elementary school that her siblings did or had. She had her own room and it had been her room for all of her life. Elinda had no more or less privileges than the other children of the family when they were the same age. None of her playmates had moved nor were there any new ones that had recently come over to play.

The hour was coming to a close. I gave Paula my card and shared that I would reflect and pray about what we had discussed. Perhaps that would make some connecting thread available to help us understand Elinda’s behavior. We agreed to meet the next week.

In my naiveté I hoped that Elinda’s mother and whole family would show up for worship the next Sunday. After all, it was the church that made it possible for me to be available to people in the neighborhood. It wasn’t cheap maintaining a large, Italianate church building over one hundred years old. Nor was it inexpensive to have even a part-time, student minister around.

The salary, in 1977, was only $3000 per year, but the parsonage was a beautiful Queen Anne Victorian manse with ten foot ceilings and marble mirrors built into the walls. Although the house was past its prime, its granite fireplace and pure wool carpet - supposedly from the bar of a paddleboat steamer (this in a parsonage of a denomination historically part of the temperance movement) - gave it a dilapidated charm. But it was poorly insulated and almost required someone skilled in architectural restoration to maintain it.

That following Sunday morning, before the processional, I scanned the congregation hoping to see Paula and meet her daughter, Elinda. Knowing something about her from personal observation would have been helpful. But they were not in attendance, nor would they be in the future, as it turned out.

There was, however, a new woman, well-dressed, in the second to last pew on the lectern side of the sanctuary. It was my custom to walk down the center aisle of the church, ten or fifteen minutes before the service, to say hello to people and just be visible. This lady must have slipped in after